Another person has suck-started a rental gun at an indoor shooting range.
That is so uncool.
You freak everybody out, get blood all over somebody else's gun so that it'll be all rusty and pitted when they finally get it back from the evidence locker, and cost the poor small-business owner a bunch of money in lost income.
I know that asking someone who is about to whack themselves to please think of other people is pointless, but think about yourself! You want to make a big dramatic gesture, right? Then do this: First, buy the most expensive gun in the place (it's not like you're planning on paying off the AmEx bill this month anyway, right? Then live a little! Go for something nice, like a Les Baer.) Buy some of the scariest-looking ammunition they have; preferably something with pictures of rappelling ninjas on the box. Now take it home.
Second, write a cryptic Goodbye Cruel World haiku. Bonus points for using mirror writing.
Then, nip off out in the woods by yourself somewhere, put down a drop cloth, lay out some elaborate scene with wax fruit, candles, and those little Fisher Price people, and get on with your business.
I guarantee you will be the talk of the town for months, if not years.
Something with zombies on the box, just in case.
ReplyDeleteGerry
Yeah, people just aren't too creative anymore.
ReplyDeleteThat happened at the indoor range I go to.
ReplyDeleteSaw a guy with a "pile O' Para" on the desk all coated in grease and oil and whatnot, and nonchalantly asked if somebody had detail stripped said item then forgotten the reverse order, and the guy said, no. The reply was, he was merely cleaning the remnants of the guy who decorated the ceiling with his last thought from the pistol. And as he put it, 6 months in an evidence locker doesn't make it less of a chore.
Secret codeword: resplep. Well, the plep has to sleep sometime.
Well, give credit where due. At least these losers aren't shooting up a mall/family gathering/school and then offing themselves (or inducing Suicide By Cop).
ReplyDelete@Randy: There is that.
ReplyDeleteClearly the solution is to require an eight hour safety course and a background check before the state issues people a suicide license. Why hasn't the Brady Campaign thought of this yet?
ReplyDeleteIt is pretty selfish to do that, almost as selfish as just asking somebody to borrow their gun.
ReplyDeleteI mean, think of the person who has to clean up the mess, so do it outside. Preferably in a boat that you've drilled holes in the bottom to let the water out of so it becomes like a mystery disappearance. Then you don't leave somebody a mess on their ceiling and floor to clean up after it's gotten all sticky.
I recommend swallowing a variety of strange fisher price people shortly before a colonoscopy. Cowboys, Indians, astronaut, Viking... A bold strange new world. Then whack off/yourself in either order you can muster. "they must have thought they had cancer, if only they had waited for that crazy lab work..."
ReplyDeleteBetter yet make a statement about the complexity of the modern world by making a Rube-Goldberg snuff'o'matic.
ReplyDeleteWe had a rash of that sort of thing down my way a little over a year ago (2 seperate incidents, If I recall correctly, one was a MURDER/Suicide). My friends were freaking out every time I went to the range worried that I was going to get shot by some wack-job. I pointed out that while firearms are at pretty much 100% dispersion at the range, statistically, I was more likely to get shot by someone trying to car-jack me on the way to the range than shot for any reason (accident, said wack-job) while there.
ReplyDeletes
"Suck-started" I lol'ed a while on that one.
ReplyDeleteWhile my father-in-law was in Boot Camp, a guy on the next bunk suck-started a Garand. The first DI on the scene told the rest of the platoon to have the courtesy to shoot themselves outside - then ordered them to clean up the mess.
They never did fix the hole in the tent - they got wet every time it rained.
would there a market for a simple cheap DIY kit to help people on their way out?
ReplyDeletejust askin'...
maybe there's some serious coin to be made here?
We had a few of those at a couple of indoor ranges locally several years ago. The businesses did a quick analyses, and imposed several draconian measures to mitigate the threat, such as refusing to rent pistols to people who did not bring their own. Some of them also will not allow non-members shoot alone.
ReplyDeleteAt least one range had surveillance video,which indicated that one of the snuffees had a rather cheerful look on her face as she went through the box of ammo, which, of course, is an indicator: Cheerful people in Seattle? We're all supposed to be grumpy introspective passive-aggressives! (One out of three...)
WV: phermit. Miss Piggy's brother-in-law.
ANON @1:43
ReplyDeleteThe regulatory paperwork and fees and other bullshit would suck up any potential profit right out of that business proposal. Unfortunately.
Drang,
ReplyDeleteIt's almost a given that any indoor range that stays open long enough will get one.
You can't see them coming; they're real cheerful and upbeat when they rent the gun. Why should they be all sad and gloomy? They know what they're going to do for the day...
The Suicide Special! Would probably look similar to the WWII Liberator handgun, might as well make it in .45 ACP just to keep the smoothbore barrel effective, plus ignite caliber wars as what would be the most effective pistol to "suck start"
ReplyDeleteSecret code: floreono. Sounds like an arrangement of beheaded plants one gives to a person they fancy on an upcoming (tomorrow!) holiday celebration commissioned by Hallmark and FTD.
we've got so many chitbirds offing themselves in public, SBC, etc etc etc...
ReplyDeletemaybe a simple binary mix-up , a just add water and drink type of kit?
i mean entrepreneurship is the amurikkan way is it not?
Yes, almost any future suicide who is capable of dragging himself to the range and renting the gun will be chock full of cheery resolve and lack of problems on the horizon.
ReplyDeleteMacabre story time. Many (many) years ago our chief got a letter in the mail from a woman who told him she was committing suicide. She gave her address along with her last will and testament. I got sent along with another officer to investigate. When we got there the house was spooky quiet. I mean Stephen King spooky. We knocked, got no answer and entered through the unlocked side door. We found a small tent erected in the living room. Inside was a deceased woman wearing a motorcycle helmet and wrapped in a sleeping bag with a revolver in her exposed right hand. She had set everything up and then shot herself in the head. Still the most bizarre scene I've ever been to.
ReplyDelete@ six...
ReplyDeletesounds like a very considerate person, too bad there aren't more like her...
Tam,
ReplyDeleteWe had a member at our club commit suicide a couple years ago on the indoor range. He left a note explaining that he knew someone responsible would find him - as opposed to traipsing off into the woods, where his gun might be found by kids, or criminals (or both).
It's about the only mitigating factor I can think of, really.
Damned. Maybe we do need Futurama style suicide booths.
ReplyDelete"This booth sponsored by Soylent Diesel Fuels!"
Jay G:
He could have set a stool in the shower stall in his bathroom, and called 911 just before offing himself. He was still inconsiderate.
@ Anon 1:43,
ReplyDeleteI think the book was called Checking Out, but I didn't find it at Amazon.com. Of course, asking around would likely get you on the NoFly list, and a look-see from the local sheriff. One of the more protracted ways is to stop eating and drinking. If you have a helper, sucking on an ice cube the first couple of days can help with thirst pangs. It takes three days.
That way, it doesn't use up resources, or risk bystanders.
Suicide by firearm is just as much as a statement as anything else.
ReplyDelete"Going out with a bang" is a romantic idea to some people. Or maybe they think it's forcing people to take note.
In any case I would much prefer that than the poor slobs who cut across the street and break their fingernails on the door they are too weak to open anymore. That crap is just creepy. Clean one of those up without nightmares, I dare you.
I think there is a special hell for people who make their kids find them though.
@Brad K:
ReplyDeleteI think the book you are referring to is "Final Exit", listing several ways to gracefully(??) check out.
My favorite was the helium tank.
cap'n chumbucket
Last week a young man in the Lower Valley a bit south of Marko put a shotgun in his mouth in the middle school cafeteria.
ReplyDeleteTo wonder what an early teen has been through to consider such a thing - oddly enough he's got the rest of his life to ponder, if he's got enough grey matter left with which to ponder. He's still alive in an ICU.
Having been the youngest at a big gun shop for 7 years I got to clean my share of such items; having been in EMS for a few decades saw some more.
Last search I assisted with we never found the guy who went off to the swamp to do himself in. Coyotes & vultures found him later, though...and months later pieces of him started showing up.
There is no place to do such things that's convenient for anyone else.
You know that if you don't pay your AmEx bill, you're still screwing someone over. Better to use your will to give some compensation to the range operators, and to the poor responders who have to clean up. -- Lyle
ReplyDeleteMy father did it in the living room of our house with his .45 to the head when I was 2 (my sisters were 1, 6 and 12). Yet another reason I'm glad I have no memory of him. In fact, any discussion of him at all is pretty much verboten in my family.
ReplyDeleteThe wife of a close friend of mine used the helium method. I am still upset with her, but grateful she chose that method.
ReplyDeleteAfter this thread I would root for spring and cheer but I heard somewhere that April is the cruelest month. Honestly I gotta say a prayer for those in such agony and another few for their families.
ReplyDeleteLyle, but if you are going to screw over someone, Amex works for me.
ReplyDeleteOut here in Colorado, we had a pair of twins fly in from New Zealand. Don't know if they intended to come here just to do themselves or if the idea popped up after arrival. They went out to a range built in a state park, rented some guns (including a FN 57 pistol - the stupidest gun I can think of to off yourself with) and proceeded to shoot themselves in unison.
But one of them botched it and survived. And got to explain her bright idea to her parents when they flew in.
Twins? The evil one must have lived!
ReplyDeleteO.k., just reading from now on...
ReplyDeleteIn a society where a number of states allow you to abandon your baby at a hospital one would think we could add a room with a syringe where you could abandon your life no questions asked. Easy clean up, and no wasting the ambulance drivers time.
ReplyDeleteTalk about selfish.
ReplyDeleteEven if -and I think we all do- we ponder the personal peace and release of no longer being...
Even if we are convinced that the world and our loved ones will be no worse off without us...
And even if the method does not necessitate the shock and trauma of being found by others, or a mess to be dealt with by them...
Suicide still denies those you love and who love you, those you lived to protect and provide for, the half-mil of insurance money that is your financial proxy in death.
For a husband, father, and provider...that is the very definition of selfish.
Wrong again, most policies only exclude suicide for two years. Read before you buy.
ReplyDeleteStaghounds, strangely enough my insurer and I did discuss those limits when I bought insurance. Mostly because we were acquaintances, and when the suicide limitation came up, we got to talking about it. Or my memory may be faulty and the conversation happened at another time when I was in their office, working on their computers.
ReplyDeleteH. Beam Piper famously put down drop cloths and turned off the utilities before he ate the piece. On the other hand, my Unca Wilson used the Hemingway Method and left lotsa splatter for the family to clean up.
ReplyDeleteAs I wrote over at Uncle's place, I think I'm at least as depressed as any gloomy Celtic person whose life is not going well, but suicide just seems, well, silly to me.
Then there are those who are feeling mildly blue, compared to me, and suicide is the first thing they think of and do.
I suspect I might be one of those folks who dare not fill and ingest a prescription for an SSRI such as Prozac, on the somewhat-respectable theory that most "depression" is just beaten-down anger, and once feeling all chipper again, I might decide to take up arms against the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, to misquote the Bard a bit.
You have a lot more faith than I do in the fairmindedness and beneficence of the sharks down at Big Pru...oh wait, now I get it.
ReplyDelete"Wrong again..."
(Cites needed)
A guy shot himself at a gunshop in my city a while back.
ReplyDeleteHe had a gun permit, so he brought one bullet with him. Asked* to be handed a gun by pretending to be interested in buying it, he covertly loaded it and shot himself in the head.
I couldn't resist glancing around for the bullet hole the next time I was there... then, I'm one sick puppy..
*you can't fondle guns without a gun permit in shops. Otherwise all the airsoft kiddies would do that..
Dang, Lanius! As I wrote at Uncle's place, get you a big bottle of compressed nitrogen and hie yerself into a small closet. No muss, no fuss, no loud noises, no splatter. It is a very easy way to go, basically you just get high (on hypoxia) and then you die.
ReplyDeleteI suspect that people who kill themselves in public with guns have theatrical tendencies.
I have always despised people who have theatrical tendencies.
P.s. Would that be "Histrionic Personality Disorder" in a very bad way?
ReplyDelete"you can't fondle guns without a gun permit in shops."
ReplyDeleteSounds like hell. Or Massachusetts.
Life insurance payments for suicide vary by state regulations - usually you have to hold the policy for a year or two before it would pay for a offing yourself.
ReplyDeleteTam said: "you can't fondle guns without a gun permit in shops."
ReplyDeleteSounds like hell. Or Massachusetts.
Lewis replied: Or North Carolina, can you believe it?
For someone who has your medical problems,and fragile mental state you sure are hard on folks who commit suicide.What, no snark about the CCW holder who shot a teenager in Florida sunday.Seems like it would be a real blast for you to snark about some idiot that thinks his pistol is safe "'cuz da clip was out",rather than to try and mine laughs out of someone who simply could not take it any more.
ReplyDeletehootie11bravo
@Anonymous 10:56 AM: Go take a flying leap off the space station and head-first into a bucket of quicklime.
ReplyDeletePeople who commit suicide don't just off themselves. They leave a horrible mess (physically, of course, but also emotionally) for the people left behind. It's a cruel, selfish thing to do. Being snarked about after they die should be the LEAST of their problems.
ReplyDeleteSounds like hell. Or Massachusetts.
Nah. Hell maybe.
Doubt gun shops in People's Republic sell 100% condition WWII vintage for $500-1500.
Just yesterday in a bar after range time I met a lucky guy who's got a $5000 worth of MG's in his safe.
He obtained the may-issue auto weapons extemption by giving some sweet lovin' to the equivalent of deputy county head of ATF.. :-o
Kicker was, after he shagged her silly once, he had to go eat her out during lunch hour twice, and then they had a year-long affair..
Apparently, though she's like 200 lbs and in her mid-forties, she's very good in the sack..and gave awesome head.
I saw her once.. respectable looking brunette, glasses, large cans, like G or H size and a big behind. Bit of a belly..but who cares?
A true gun nut would do literally anything to get his hands on a machinegun collection!
I like the idea of suicidists taking others into consideration. Also, I want to promote the idea of murder-suicides becoming suicide-murders. If once you've offed yourself and you are lying dead on the floor you feel the urge to injure someone else go right ahead.
ReplyDeleteHad this happen in my local range and now its creepy to go in there, thanks dead guy.
"you can't fondle guns without a gun permit in shops."
ReplyDeletePretty sure NJ is the same.
Hell, last time I was there, the clerk told me it was illegal for him to even unlock the display case if I didn't have the required paperwork needed to handle a firearm. When I told him I now lived across the country, he just told me to leave the store.
Without hitting the whole story, once knew someone who suicided, and to my way of thinking made damn sure to leave a mess. Borrowed a gun from a friend to go target shooting- which she'd done before- and offed herself in the bedroom. Where it took two days for family to find her AND having left a friend who she fucked over by using his pistol to do it with.
ReplyDeleteAnd she was a nurse: any number of drugs she could have laid hold of and used, but oh no, that wasn't 'certain enough'; had to involve someone else.
drugs are too fickle..
ReplyDeletenurses don't know shit too.
I mind the Dorothy Sayers mystery about the guy who was so vain he shot himself in the chest instead of the head, so as to leave a better-looking corpse.
ReplyDeleteWe had a murder-suicide here a while back in which a woman shot her daughter in the head and seems to have been so grossed out by the results that she shot her own self in the chest, instead.
Then there was the case of Alice Sheldon's murder-suicide of her husband and herself. As a Christian I deplore such things, but I reckon they both thought it was necessary euthanasia, as well as cheating the hangman.
Had a coworker off himself several years ago. Electrical engineer. Good engineer, lousy human being.
ReplyDeleteHe designed a mechanism to electrocute himself. Started out with a fifth of wild turkey. Drank some, filled the tub with water climbed in, finished the bottle while waiting for the random timer to trigger.
Thirty minutes after the timer went off, his computer dialed 911 with a recorded message. The EMTs arrived at the house to find very detailed instructions on the unlocked front door (and repeated on the bathroom door) how to safely enter the bathroom and diable the device.
His house was empty of anything of any value. Over the next week or so most of his few remaining family and friends received shipments of personal items that he wanted them to have.
He had owned 5 firearms which he had "loaned" out to others. I got a letter three days after his suicide that simply said "Sorry, Keep the rifle."
F-him, I gave it to the EMT that had to haul him out of the bathroom. The couple guys I know who got boxes from him didn't even open them. They just tossed them out, or dropped them off at the goodwill.
Why was he lousy? He was pretty considerate in his suicide method.
ReplyDeleteIf I had to go out, I'd go out with a 5 kilo TNT bang. In a crowd of lawyers preferably.
Just kidding.. I want to die aged 789 from boredom. Or never die. That may become an option 70 years from now..
Yep, Lanius, me too. I want to stick around and see what happens, no matter how bad and gloomy I feel.
ReplyDeletehootie11bravo,
ReplyDelete"For someone who has your medical problems,and fragile mental state you sure are hard on folks who commit suicide."
Given my medical problems and fragile mental state and the fact that I haven't suck-started a shotgun, I'll harsh on whoever the fuck I want to here on my own blog.
ReplyDeleteGiven my medical problems and fragile mental state and the fact that I haven't suck-started a shotgun, I'll harsh on whoever the fuck I want to here on my own blog.
A harsh reaction. Has bravo his too close to the bone?
I've been the guy that has to clean that up... twice in fact. To be fair, the second guy that tried it didn't die, but he did make one hell of a mess. The first time, there was a young woman present that was a first-time shooter. The second time, a father was shooting with his young children. Both times, it left other shooters and the staff VERY distraught. "Uncool" doesn't even begin to describe how selfish those acts were. They probably left some folks scarred for life. At the time, I was making around 8 bucks an hour... not nearly enough money to be cleaning up blood and teeth. The only upside to it was that I managed to score a Glock 21 for $150 as a result... but cleaning caked-on gore off of it after picking it up from the evidence room really sucked.
ReplyDelete
ReplyDeleteThey probably left some folks scarred for life.
For life? Those people were wimps...